Shapleigh requested President Obama’s help blowing the whistle on ‘Bowie Plan’

Former State Senator Eliot Shapleigh said he had to go all the way to President Barack Obama to get someone to do something about a cheating scheme at the El Paso Independent School District.

“It was very difficult to make things happen. I went to Jaime Esparza, he didn’t do anything. I went to the TEA, they didn’t do anything. I finally went to Barack Obama and wrote him a letter,” Shapleigh said, “It took that letter and the Department of Justice getting involved, which got the FBI involved, which made everything happen.”

It was back in 2010 when the state senator said he had a hunch students at Austin High School were disappearing.

According to school district records, in the 2007-08 school year, 639 freshmen enrolled at Austin High. The following year only 348 of those students enrolled as sophomores in the fall. That same spring, only 287 remained.

Shapleigh still wants to know what happened to 352 missing Austin Panthers.

“What we’re seeing is a systematic removal of these students at the high school level,” Shapleigh said.

In 2012, former EPISD Superintendent, Dr. Lorenzo Garcia pleaded guilty in connection with a scheme to hold back back certain freshmen or promote them to the 11th grade so that they could avoid state-mandated exams in the 10th grade.

“Cheating? No!,” said John Tanner, the principal at Austin High at the time. Tanner told ABC-7 the “disappeared” students either dropped out of school, transferred or were held back because they couldn’t meet academic requirements.

Tanner is among those indicted by a federal grand jury Wednesday.

“Tanner was in my senate office saying there was no cheating, the very day we were announcing that and I think time has proven him wrong,” Shapleigh said. “I think he was one of the major actors in this at Austin, which was only second to Bowie.”

Shapleigh said Damon Murphy, responsible for overseeing the district’s Priority Schools Division, was another major actor in the scheme.

“He was like the quarterback. It was his job to disappear kids.”

Murphy was indicted in connection with the cheating scheme Wednesday.

“It’s the beginning of the end,” Shapleigh said.

ABC-7 contacted District Attorney Jaime Esparza’s office Wednesday. No one could be reached for comment.